The Best-Read Presidents

19. James Buchanan

C-SPAN: 42

Considered the worst president in our history, James Buchanan not only loved reading, but also being read to. He was in the habit of reading himself to sleep every night with a candlestick and candle, terrified of burning a hole in his books, according to George Ticknor Curtis’s biography. And, frequently, he did. A dazzling conversationalist, he could even quote many passages from the classics verbatim, memorized since his college days. Buchanan read all sorts of literature, though his favorite material was the New Testament and books about its teachings. In his final years, however, he announced that he was “tired of reading,” according to Curtis.